The Core

The process of hunting was similar to the previous day. Creep around the trees until spotting something worth targeting, and then kill it. Their bags were fuller today than yesterday and when Taylon tied the bags to the tree so they could rest in its branches, it was harder to wrap the rope around the bags securely. “Helena left to sell leftover meat,” Lark mentioned when they were comfortable on a thick branch. “Why didn’t we just eat it?”

Both sat facing the town, which was small and hardly visible from their perch. Their legs dangled over the branch and Taylon swung his in an alternating pattern. When his left leg was back, his right was forward and vice versa. Lark noticed his pattern and the precision that accompanied it but said nothing. “Well, Andor and I caught too much and even if we tried to eat it all, it would go bad before we could. Helena takes the meat and sells it so that someone’s family that isn’t so honed with hunting can eat it before it spoils.”

“Oh,” Lark answered simply. It made sense. They were not selfish people and being wasteful and gluttonous was selfish. These people supported each other. The hunters supported their families and then the others who couldn’t support their families for whatever reason. “Why don’t you go to town more often? Andor went today with Tyrion and Helena, why not yourself or your mother?”

“Town is too far for my mother to walk to. She’s going to give birth soon and the walk is strenuous. I prefer not to leave my mother. I feel like when my father isn’t home, and if I’m not hunting I should be there to take care of her.” He shrugged, not looking at her as he spoke. Lark’s eyes hadn’t moved from his profile as he spoke. The man she knew was so vulnerable at that moment and honestly, any moment they had alone he was vulnerable.

Lark spoke softly, “Your mother is a big girl; she took care of you.”

Taylon released a chuckle. “You think everyone is a big girl, don’t you? Yourself, my mother, I’m sure you think Helena is as well.” Easily, he swung a single leg over the branch so he was facing her. He pushed backwards to lean against the smooth trunk of the tree.

“We would all survive easily on our own. You don’t need other people to survive, you know,” she offered. This time, she was the one not turning to face him. Instead her focus was on a nonexistent point in the horizon. It seemed as if she was still able to see The Core from here.

He groaned, drawing her attention back. “That’s just the Advisor speaking.” Taylon looked at her and captured her complete attention at that moment. “I know that you don’t really think that. You’re a prime example of how false that statement is.”

“How are the Advisor and Lark different, Taylon? They were raised the same way, trained the same. We are the product of our environments, nothing more.” She stared at him willing him to give a sufficient answer. She wanted nothing more than to hear his explanation. Lark and the Advisor were the same two people, the same entity in the same body sharing the same mind. It was impossible for that to not be.

He shook his head, denying her statement. “Andor and I were raised the same way, trained the same. We are different. You have this front, The Advisor, and when you don’t want to answer honestly or don’t know how to answer appropriately to express yourself, you give the generic bullshit answer that The Core taught you. ‘You can survive on your own. You are a product of your environment.’” He threw his arms up flustered. “It’s all generic. If you were a product of your environment completely, you wouldn’t be sitting on this branch with me in this very moment.”

She laughed humorlessly. “Maybe you overestimate me? Maybe I’m just a puppet of The Core. What do you know?”

“Why are you fighting me on this? Do you want to be just a piece in their game of lives? Is that what you feel you’re worth? Just stay there hoarding the secrets of the world or did you want to actually experience life?” He asked instead of answering her questions. He couldn’t put his explanation into words so he just left it.

"Why are you fighting me?” she countered. “I am not a piece, you are. As far as they know, I'm dead. I don't exist anymore. But, you. You're still under their control. I am worth more than just hoarding the secrets. I protect, you have no idea what one can do with secrets."

Taylon wasn’t going to fight with her over this. The Core knew all and if that meant that he would be better off dead, then so be it. He would never know. No one would ever know because Palimea would no longer exist. It would be like it never happened. “If you say so, Secrets.”

He no longer wanted to sit still. He was beginning to get antsy. Instead of climbing off the branch the right way, he swung down and dropped in a lithe, simple movement and began working at the knots of the rope around the bags.

In a similar nimble movement, she landed with a thud in the unforgiving snow. Taylon had untied the knot and was loading both heavy bags over his shoulders. She watched with observing eyes as he began walking away from her without words. “Hey, are you mad at me now?” Lark voiced. When he didn’t slow or even show that he had heard her, she spoke again. “Taylon, talk to me.”

Her steps were better than yesterday but she was still unsteady on the snow. She tripped over branches and roots when she wasn’t paying attention to where she was walking because instead she was trying to gain the boy’s glance, even. “If you don’t say something to me, I’m turning around and walking the opposite direction.”

Taylon faltered in his consistent stride. The images of her partially dead corpse lying in this snow reappeared before his eyes. He spun around. She was standing in the snow and her red markings shone against her pale skin. Her eyes were bright and perfect and her face was set. “Truth or dare?” he asked.

Her eyebrows furrowed above her crystalline eyes within an instant. “Truth?” she asked. It was more a question than a statement. She had no idea why she was choosing between either and what it had to do with their conversation.

“Tell me why you are here still.”

The question in her eyes was evident. Still. She shrugged. It was something she hadn’t thought of. “I guess we’ll find out” was her only response.

When she stood beside him, he matched his stride to hers and grabbed her hand, intertwining their fingers. Lark was uncomfortable with the intimacy. It wasn’t her usual kind of touching. She attempted to pull away but that only made his fingers press tighter against her fair, delicate skin. “I’m carrying both bags; don’t fight this.”

Honestly, she couldn’t see the relation between the two seemingly unrelated topics. Before long though, she realized that she didn’t care what the relation was. The heat from his fingers wrapped around hers and spread upward through her arm. It became comforting after a while. He helped her over the perils of the snow this time instead of just pulling her behind like a rag doll.

After emerging from the thickest part of the woods, Taylon slowed his pace. “Tell me about the other Advisors; I’d like to know which are real from my mother’s stories.”

Lark looked at him surprised. For a moment, she didn’t think she heard him correctly. “Why do you care about that?” she asked.

Simply, he shrugged.

Realizing she wasn’t going to receive an explanation further than that, she began thinking of how to explain the others. “Well, there’s Pernix, and she is the Advisor of Fate. When people or places or things are created by the others, she can see what is happening with them. She’s one of my favorites.” She furrowed her brow not sure who to talk about next. “Well, then there’s Anthrax. He’s the Advisor of War and his undying loyalty is a particularly annoying trait.”

Taylon laughed then. “You, the girl who can be so righteous it’s unbearable, thinks that someone else is annoying?”

She gaped at his bluntness. “Well, fine. If you don’t want to hear about them.”

“No, I do, I swear!” he said, genuinely curious about the others.

Lark was stubborn, though. He had angered her in that simple laugh. It wasn’t appropriate and it was certainly uncalled for. “Well, you lost your chance, Mister. Ask me again later and maybe I’ll take pity on your curious mind.”